A Darkness Absolute (Casey Duncan #2)(107)

“Today, I’m bottling one keg of lager, one of pale ale, and my first-ever batch of stout. You get to sample the stout.”

“I’m not really a fan of—”

“Too bad,” Isabel says. “Your task then is to tell me whether it tastes even worse than stout you’ve had before.”

“And if it does, you’ll dump it?”

“I don’t dump anything, sugar. I just sell it at a discount. You’re going to test the lager, too. I’ve made an adjustment to the recipe.”

I hop up on a stool at a high table. “Eric won’t love that.”

“Oh, I made the usual, too, just for him. I know better than to annoy him over the trivial. Save it for the things that count. Like convincing him to bring in a case of champagne for New Year’s Eve.”

“You’re going to treat the town to champagne? That’s so sweet.”

She doesn’t even dignify that with a response.

“If you’re asking for my help persuading him—” I begin.

“I know better. I’ll handle this.”

“If your plan involves telling him I’d love champagne for my first New Year’s in Rockton, I don’t actually care for it.”

She hesitates, a glass in hand.

“And yes,” I said, “he knows that. He saw it on the menu last time we were in Dawson City. He offered. I said I’d rather stick to wine. You’ll need a plan B. Preferably one that doesn’t involve playing on his new-relationship insecurities.”

“But his new-relationship insecurities are adorable. And terribly useful.”

I give her a look.

“Don’t worry. I consider you a friend. Which means I will refrain from exploiting your lover any more than absolutely necessary. Now, let’s get to this sampling so I can bottle these kegs. Business has been very fine since the rydex supply dried up.”

“You really think it has dried up?”

“No more than you do. Eric is hopeful, but the dear boy has far too little experience of the world. We know better. When our purveyors of fine opiates passed on to the great drug lab in the sky, the supply began to dwindle, until poor Will had to beg the council to double our buprenorphine shipment to deal with withdrawal symptoms. And yet…”

“It’s too convenient,” I say. “There had to be more people involved. And someone on the council itself had to have gotten the base supplies to Rockton. The rydex has just dried up while they retool the plan.”

“And in the meantime?” She lifts a sample glass. “My business is booming.” She sets the glass in front of me. “Drink up.”

I do and then say, “Tastes like shit. Which means, yes, it tastes like stout.”

“Excellent. Take the coffee on your left to clear your palate, and we’ll move on.”

“I must bear a striking resemblance to a guinea pig. Mathias did this to me just a few days ago, with sausage.”

“You know, that’s something that never fails to amaze me. The man makes people terribly nervous, and yet everyone eats the sausage without question. Then they wonder what happens to those bodies we supposedly dispose of deep in the forest.”

I roll my eyes and sip the lukewarm coffee.

“Oh, come now,” she says. “You can see it. Mathias running his own little enterprise on the side. Dear Sheriff Dalton, why don’t you let me dispose of those bodies for you? I know just the place for them.” She hands me a second glass. “The only reason we don’t seriously consider it is that we know Eric wouldn’t let anyone dispose of those bodies except him. Otherwise? We’ll all admit, Dr. Atelier does have an air of the Demon Barber about him.”

I take a swig of the lager.

“Which is what you’re here to discuss?” she says.

I look up.

“Not whether Mathias is grinding dead people into sausage. He has become a suspect, and other than Eric, no one has known him as long as I have. Arguably, I know him even better.”

“Not as well as he’d like, I suspect.”

“Oh, I have not missed the doctor’s interest, but I have never reciprocated. That seems unwise.”

“Why?”

She smiles. “Ah, so here is how you’ll do it. Rather than ask what I think of him in general, you’ll ascertain why I’ve never succumbed to his interest in me. Which may answer your question better than the general response. How’s the lager?”

“Well, it’s a good thing you made Eric’s usual, too.”

“What’s wrong with it?”

“Not a thing. It just doesn’t taste like Eric’s, which means he won’t want it.”

She fills my glass, pours one for herself and pulls up another stool.

“There was a time when Mathias would have fascinated me,” she says. “He still does, in his way, but the woman who’d have let herself be seduced by Mathias Atelier was a much younger Isabel, one with a regrettable taste for…”

She considers. Sips her beer. Considers some more. “I could say bad boys, but that’s not entirely accurate. These days, when one speaks of bad boys, one means a certain subtype. A young man who rides a motorcycle, knocks heads together on Saturday night, and is as faithful as a tomcat. My interests, as a younger woman, leaned toward men like Mathias, who is none of those things and yet more dangerous in his way than a dozen of those young men. I learned my lesson down south, one that taught me I’m much happier with men like Mick. Good men. Undemanding men. Men who are easy to understand and easy to love and easily return that love. But I suppose you were hoping for a more specific answer.”